Spineflower Still Thorn in Valley Developer’s Side

An unprecedented threat by a golf course developer to destroy a penny-sized wildflower has suddenly, if unintentionally, put the fate of rugged Big Tujunga Wash on the map.

Since 1987, developer Cosmo World Corp. has fought a quiet, behind-the-scenes battle with a handful of homeowner activists and bureaucrats to build a private, championship golf course on a 355-acre parcel in the wash.

But the fight lost much of its anonymity two weeks ago when Cosmo, citing an obscure law, threatened to remove a fragile population of slender-horned spineflowers from its property in the wash, a move aimed at easing the way to build its golf course.

The spineflower, a small and unremarkable-looking plant, has been classified as an endangered species and has a special status not only in law but in the hearts of environmentalists.

Thus, when Cosmo threatened to remove the plant from its property, the move appeared to backfire, galvanizing the environmental community, which had heretofore largely ignored the struggle over Big Tujunga Wash.

“It’s been a great help to us that Cosmo came in with that outrageous proposal,” said Jill Swift, a longtime San Fernando Valley environmental activist. “The environmental movement is stretched very thin. But when there’s a threat against an endangered species, it brings them in. It’s a great organizing tool.”

Swift and homeowner activist Bill Eick say Cosmo’s bold threat has helped build a growing constituency to save Big Tujunga Wash by shifting the debate from the often turgid, bureaucratic haggling over environmental impact reports and mitigation programs to a life-and-death struggle between a developer and a plant and its habitat.

Witness, for example, the reaction to Cosmo’s threat:

* State Assemblyman Richard Katz (D-Sylmar) told a crowd of 450 community leaders in Studio City recently that he could be counted on to stand fast against Cosmo’s moves against the spineflower and called for turning the privately owned wash into public parkland. “People are ready to chain themselves to bulldozers” to block Cosmo’s plan, he said.

* Councilman Joel Wachs, who represents the wash area but remained quietly on the sidelines during the years of bickering between the developer and its opponents, has become vociferous on the issue.

“I am zonkers about this,” Wachs said upon hearing of Cosmo’s plan to remove or destroy the plant. Wachs subsequently warned the developer to withdraw its plan against the spineflower or face the city’s wrath, a warning that, according to an attorney for Cosmo, was instrumental in persuading his client to at least temporarily withdraw the threat.

* The city’s environmental community, which has been traditionally focused on issues related to the Westside and the Santa Monica Mountains, also jumped into the fray.

The Natural Resources Defense Council, a national environmental group, fired off a letter advising state and federal officials on legal strategies to block Cosmo’s designs on the spineflower.

“The publicity over this has educated a lot of the public about what’s at stake here,” said Michael Fitts, an attorney for the NRDC. “It certainly has raised the red flag.”

Such attention is long overdue for both the spineflower and its home, Big Tujunga Wash, said Swift and John Crandell, a Sunland-based landscape architect and supporter of the wash.

The wash has the distinction of being among the half-dozen areas in Los Angeles recognized as “ecologically important” in the city’s General Plan.

It shares that status with parts of the Santa Monica Mountains and the Ballona wetlands in Playa Vista, better-known areas that have more numerous, more vocal and more affluent defenders from the Westside.

The northeast San Fernando Valley, Crandell said recently, is “kind of a backwater area. The general awareness of us by other parts of the Valley and certainly in the metropolitan area is pretty low.”

Triggering the recent uproar about Big Tujunga Wash was a notice from Cosmo, dated Oct. 6, to officials at the state Department of Fish and Game and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service inviting them to salvage the spineflower plants on its property.

If these agencies took no action within 10 days, Cosmo said it would be within its rights to remove or eliminate the spineflower on its land.

The notice drew widespread reactions of anger and dismay.

Before the 10 days elapsed, the state of California and the city of Los Angeles warned that they would sue Cosmo if it molested the spineflower. In the face of this squall, Cosmo temporarily withdrew, pledging not to renew its removal threat against the spineflower for at least 90 days.

In many quarters, the threat against the spineflower was, at the very least, seen as a public relations fiasco for Cosmo. At worst, it “might poison” Cosmo’s relations with the agencies that continue to hold authority over the firm’s project, one official said.

“Whether it was an act of frustration or intimidation, it hasn’t worked,” said Arline DeSanctis, a Wachs deputy who has worked on the project. “I think it’s backfired on them.”

“It certainly hasn’t helped,” said Peter Stine, acting local field director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “How could it? We’re trying to work out solutions, but this particular threat does not lead to constructive solutions.”

The Wildlife Service is still negotiating with Cosmo about how to build the golf course without jeopardizing the spineflower, which is found only on a small, but central, portion of Cosmo’s property.

Earlier this month, the agency tentatively found that the latest Cosmo rendition of its project would still jeopardize the spineflower.

Under its latest plan, Cosmo had agreed to set aside 78 acres within its golf course as a spineflower preserve, 13 acres more than it had originally earmarked. Additionally, the company agreed to establish a separate 100-acre preserve of alluvial scrubland, the unique habitat in which the spineflower flourishes.

But in a draft opinion, dated Oct. 4, the Wildlife Service said Cosmo’s latest proposal failed because the acreage set aside for the spineflower was insufficient and because the flood-control systems Cosmo designed to protect its multimillion-dollar investment would prevent the spineflower’s habitat from being periodically flooded. Such flooding, scientists believe, is required for the spineflower’s survival.

The Wildlife Service’s opinion on such ecological matters is critical to Cosmo’s efforts to obtain a so-called 404 permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The lack of a favorable opinion increases the likelihood that the corps will not issue the 404 permit.

Meanwhile, executives at Cosmo, which is owned by Japanese businessman Minoru Isutani, who once owned the famous Pebble Beach golf courses, have for the most part refused to comment on the latest flap.

However, Cosmo attorney Mark Armbruster said recently that he remains optimistic that the controversy of the past two weeks has not hurt Cosmo’s chances of winning the permits required to build a golf course.

“We’re hopeful that we can resolve the outstanding issues about the golf course’s design,” Armbruster said. “We still want to have a project that protects the spineflower.”

Armbruster said proponents of the golf course project, many of whom are residents of the Sunland-Tujunga area, also have been galvanized into action.

“After Assemblyman Katz suggested that the state acquire Big Tujunga Wash for a park, a lot of our people expressed their outrage,” Armbruster said. “It’s put our side in high gear.”

Armbruster said Cosmo’s supporters believe a private, championship golf course will provide a big boost to the economy of sleepy Sunland Tujunga. Cosmo’s long-range goal is to lure the Los Angeles Open from the Riviera Country Club in the Pacific Palisades.

Jim Peterson, a Cosmo supporter, wrote to Katz, challenging him to answer his questions: “What earthly good is the spineflower?” and “Does the spineflower have some human use?”

“Please do not waste any more of the taxpayers’ money on buying more public land,” he concluded.

In the Rough: Golf Course vs. Flower

Since 1987, Cosmo World Corp., a Japanese-owned golf course development firm, has sought to build the Los Angeles International Golf Club, an 18-hold championship course, on 355 acres in the Big Tujunga Wash. Efforts were stymied in when it was learned that the wash is home to an endangered plant species.

The Plant

Slender-horned spineflower: Dodecahema leptoceras

Height: Up to four inches

Habitat: Dry, sandy soil in alluvial scrubland

Growth period: April-June

The Project

1973: The Los Angeles Planning Department declares the Big Tujunga Wash an “ecologically important area” and restricts future development to agriculture.

1987: Cosmo World begins purchasing land in the flood plain of the wash, intending to build a championship golf course to lure the Los Angeles Open away from a Pacific Palisades country club.

1993: Citing an obscure state law, Cosmo World notifies officials in an Oct. 6 letter that they have 10 days to “salvage” the spineflower before the company develops the site. Cosmo suspends the plan when the state threatens legal action.

Sources: Illustrated Flora of the Pacific States, The Jepson Manual of Higher Plants of California.